I have as many rings as Ron Gardenhire.

When you fetishize low-budget teams, you say dumb things:

"He is the manager of the Twins, since 2002, and even though he doesn't make it to the World Series on a short payroll, his team is always a favorite to make noise in the AL Central. Last season he did better than the Yankees and came closer to the first round of the playoffs, losing a play-in game to the White Sox in Chicago."

His team didn't do better than the Yankees.

His team won fewer games in a weaker division.

Besides, according to Lupica Yankee Logic, you either win the World Series or you do not.

Saying "even though he doesn't make it to the World Series" is kind of like saying, "even though it's dark at night, it's just like day."


"The truth is that Gardenhire's Twins have been grinding that way for years, doing that on the short payroll but with a wonderful farm system, developing talent and losing talent and playing the game right, winning 90 or more games four times since '02."

Big deal.


"Somehow, though, the Twins keep producing good kids and good arms, and there are people that think that the wild card in the American League this season might be as likely to come out of the AL Central as it is the East."

"There are people." Good journalism.

I think the AL Wild Card will come out of the AL East. But I also think four out of five AL East teams will be good and it's likely that they keep beating themselves, opening the door for an 85-win team from the AL Central or the AL West.


"The money keeps coming into baseball in record numbers, and the big teams keep throwing it around pretty good, even though only two teams to win the World Series since the Yankees won in 2000 have had a payroll of more than $100 million and both of them were winning teams from Boston. Gardenhire's Twins never spend a lot and never will. Still they had their bags packed last season and were ready to go play the Rays in the division series if they could have gotten by the White Sox."

Almost winning is the same thing as winning.

I'll remember that when I put a ring on ARod's finger for almost making the World Series in 2004.

Kind of how Jason Bay gets tons of credit for almost making the World Series last season.

Because, you know, Jason Bay is not Manny Ramirez. Manny Ramirez is a cancer. The kind of World-Series-Winning cancer that brings a whole team down.